I just got this message:

A French canadian guy came across a guestbook entry at a certain hostel in valpo. He was astounded that the entry happened to be yours, as he had bumped into you in cusco and el chantel.

He then proceeded to tell us about your numerous bodily complications.. followed by the statement.. yeah Roosh is a funny guy.

We werent really listening to him up until the word Roosh was shouted across the hostel breakfast table. Turns out youre quite the backpacker celebrity! Luckily we were able to experience cosmonova without actually going there through your detailed recount.

Backstory:

I met a few Australian girls in Buenos Aires.

I met a guy in Cusco, Peru who is French Canadian. Two months later, I randomly bump into him again in Patagonia, about a thousand miles away.

In Valparaiso, after Peru but before Argentina, I stayed at a hostel that had a guestbook. After a horrible night out I put in a lot of care writing a warning to fellow travellers about a certain club. I signed it with just “Roosh.”

Both the girls and the guy went to Valparaiso at the same hostel at the same time and discovered that they both knew me through this guestbook entry, which I paste for you here (I drafted it on my laptop):

My opinion of Valparaiso will be shaped by what happened to me on Wednesday, October 24, 2007. I went to the club strip off the water and landed in a club called Cosmonova. The main bar only had a dozen people, so I explored and found a room guarded by a stocky bouncer. Inside was a semi-circle of guys sitting quietly in chairs, waiting for something. I thought this was the gay part of the club but there was another room nearby that only had girls. I asked the bartender what was going on but with her Chilean spanish she might as well have been talking in Portuguese.

A local overheard my confusion and escorted me back into the room of men. In the middle of the semi-circle was an overweight chilean woman, wearing only sunglasses. And I mean only sunglasses. Men hooted and hollered as they filmed her with their cell phone cameras. “Very sexy?” the local asked me, in a tone like he was trying to convince me how great his country is for having this spectacle. I nodded yes but it was as sexy as watching a hot dog eating competition. I went back to the bar.

The show ended 15 minutes later. I know this because an avalanche of men frantically searching for a meal poured into the bar. Many went hungry as there was only one girl for every three of them. I use the word “girl” loosely: many were over 30, the type who gets a kick out of watching a shaved, eyebrow plucked man wave his manhood while wearing nothing but a pair of sneakers.

I think it’s time to go back to Argentina.

South America is a big continent. Even with Lonely Planet, the odds of this happening is incredibly small. It made my day.

My second contribution to the Volette travel blog is up. It guides you through the most interesting ruins of Cuzco, Peru (with pictures). You can read it here.

I found that I liked Machu Picchu a bit more after writing and thinking about it.

I was going to pass on Machu Picchu but the peer pressure was too great. It was an expensive notch:

$75 train ride to the town nearest Machu Picchu
$12 round-trip bus ride to Machu Picchu
$40 entrance fee
$7 rip-off mini pizza in town

That’s fine as I can say I took this picture:

The views were beautiful and I’m glad I went, but the magic of Machu Picchu is less when you’ve already visited Pompeii in Italy. I would have been more impressed if I was a ruin virgin, but as you know I get around. I’m at the point in life where I’m more excited by a nightclub’s interesting bathroom than an ancient stone structure.

Intestinal parasite survivor

It’s time for Bolivia. Please say a prayer for my stomach.

I hopped on a local bus back to Cusco after a visit to the Incan ruins of Pisac. The bus was packed so I had to stand in the aisle, and was faced with the serious decision of whether I should give ass or crotch to the gentleman sitting down next to me. I had to go with crotch because it was the best way I could hold on. Well, after about ten minutes, he fell asleep on my package. I could feel his head on my head. This being one of the top five highlights of my trip so far, I took a picture with my replacement camera (same one as before).

At one point he got up, lifted his head, stared off into space for five seconds and then went right back to my crotch. (They always come back for more.) I wanted to put my hand on his head for the photo but I estimated a high probability of conflict.

I have parasites attached to the wall of my small intestine, sucking away my nutrients and causing unspeakable bathroom adventures. I saw a doctor and she prescribed me something to defeat the flagellated monsters that are dampening my already mediocre South American experience. The only side effect is urine that has a neon yellow appearance. It’s like I’m radioactive!

There are a couples ways to get giardia, but this is how I think I got it:

1. Some guy took a monster dump and wiped his ass. He did not wash his hands, which now contained fecal matter.
2. He cooked up a meal, poking and prodding said meal with his feces soaked paw.
3. He served that meal to me.
4. I ingested his feces.

What’s good about South America is that when something good happens, like you find an internet connection faster than dial-up or a clean toilet bowl not dirtied by someone with the same condition as you, it brings you that much more happiness. Still, I’m going to need a little more than being able to watch a YouTube video.

I was only going to stay in Lima for a couple nights but the nightlife sucked me in and I ended up staying for a week.

Tuesday. There is a mall built into a beach cliff called LarcoMar that has several clubs, including Bartini, a house venue that is most similar to Spank back in D.C. The girls were unfriendly and no one danced until after 1AM, maybe because the DJ’s refused to spin any Ministry of Sound-like anthems. My buzz was killed due to gunfire outside the club. $3 cover includes a free beer. 1.5 vodka shots out of 5.

Wednesday. A $5 cover gets you into El Dragon with a free Pisco Sour. A much nicer crowd danced to popular house, rock, and some 80′s and 90′s, the best mix I heard in Lima. A bit of a sausage fest but the girls were cute and wanted to be talked to. I got a kick out of partying until 4:30AM on a Wednesday night. 3.5 vodka shots out of 5.

Thursday. Sargento Pimienta (Sargent Pepper) is a warehouse with speakers where all the young, very white Peruvians go to party. The old school music is the type that would clear most American dance floors (Celebrate, Getting Jiggy With It, etc), and there was a horrible one hour set by a wannabe Eminem rapper who has only mastered saying “Uh” and “Wooooh!” in the microphone. A breakdancer got on stage and shouted “Fuck Bush,” but gave props to Los Angeles. Cover is $5. 1.5 vodka shots out of 5.

The night ended at Eka, a lounge bar that serves more as a date venue than a pick-up spot. Downstairs is the “Factoria” where Death Speed Trance was being played at an insanely fast 148 beats per minute. The four people who were on the dancefloor looked like they were having seizures. I’m pretty confident the DJ killed small furry animals as a child. 0 methamphetamine hits out of 5.

Friday. Gotica is a mega-club in Larcomar, with an astronomical $16 cover (by Peruvian standards) that keeps out the gringo riff-raff who rather drink cheaply and talk sports in the hostel bar.

It’s not easy to work the club solo due to its impersonal size, but it had the most beautiful girls I’ve ever seen in my life. Some were friendly, some weren’t, but it’s quite a feeling to be standing with your manly beer and looking down at this sea of fine exotic women. Believe me when I say I savored the moment, and I would have taken a picture for you with my second disposable camera had it not been stolen while I danced. An Israeli who introduced me to the club summed it up nicely: “It’s hard not to hook up with a girl there. The only problem is you’ll have a girl early but you’ll be thinking if you can get something hotter.” 5 vodka shots out of 5.

Saturday. Gotica.

Everyone has bad things to say about Lima, starting with the depressing fog that permanently blankets the city during winter, but it’s been the highlight of my trip so far.

Last Tuesday night I went to Bartini, an unfortunate name for what is an okay house club in the very wealthy Miraflores area of Lima.

At around 2AM I was leaning against the bar near the front of the club, keeping my eye on a drunk bodybuilder who earlier fell on his ass and tried to blame me for it, when I heard pop pop. My body jumped and I turned to the front door—the sound came from right outside the club. No one seemed to care so I wrote it off as nothing serious but then five seconds later two burly bouncers braced themselves against the door. A third guy came up behind them and pulled out a gun with his right hand and cocked the barrel back with his left. The bouncers let him out and he disappeared. I was about 10 feet away.

There is no “Is this really happening?” hesitation when you see a gun. Right away I got down against the bar and a lot of other people did the same. I was scared but not pants urinating scared. There was a circle of people around me so I selfishly thought I’d be fine if gun shots came inside. Everyone was calm and quiet, and the DJ kept spinning. No one jumped out the windows.

After three minutes the coast seemed clear and I walked towards the back of the club. I stood there and watched as people resumed drinking, smoking, and laughing, like this happens all the time (it actually doesn’t in this area of Lima). I looked to the girl next to me and asked, “¿Que paso?”

She made the universal gun sign with her hand, grinned, and said, “Bong bong.” I left a few minutes later in case the shooter returned to finish the job.

I talked to a girl who showed me a stack of napkins with notes written in Spanish by Ecuadorian men, mostly waiters. She couldn’t understand them so I translated. They were all along these lines:

It was nice to meet you. You are very pretty. I hope I can see you again.

juan@lovesgringas.com
Juan

My napkins have no words of affection, just email addresses, mostly of European men. Girls who travel don’t realize their experience is very different than a guy’s. Unless the girl is busted, which unfortunately happens, she is getting ten times more attention than me. I know some of that is bad attention, but you only see a smile on a gringa’s face when she’s being spun around on the salsa dancefloor. And disappointment on the native’s face when she doesn’t want to make out.

(Side note: girls who don’t get much love back in the States are treated like queens by South American man. It’s very common to see an American 5 walking arm-in-arm with a decent looking guy. Many of these girls end up staying for much longer than they had planned.)

When crossing Ecuador’s border into Peru, I was a little confused on where to get my Peru entry stamp. I walked towards an Ecuadorian border agent to ask him, but before I could open my mouth he shooed me down the road with a hand-sweep motion. When I returned with my stamp an American girl was having the same problem. This time the same guy waited for her to come to him, let her ask her question in bad Spanish, and then very politely talked to her, smiled, and pointed down the road. Multiple this by a dozen interactions a day and I imagine the overall experience would be quite different.

Expectedly, girls here refuse to admit that they are getting different treatment than me. (They remind me of the girls back home who think they will physically peak past 30.) Next time a girl asks me why I don’t think South Americans are “wonderful” and the nicest people in the world, I’m going to point to her vagina.